<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Petals For Armor by MiinAandeg</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25944307">Petals For Armor</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiinAandeg/pseuds/MiinAandeg'>MiinAandeg</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>15 Day Lyric Challenge 2020 [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cultural Customs, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route, Generational Trauma, M/M, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Pre-Battle Rituals, Pre-Slash, Racism</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 06:47:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,495</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25944307</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiinAandeg/pseuds/MiinAandeg</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"You do not know me,” Dedue says.</p><p>“Doesn’t mean I can’t care for you,” Claude says. “And besides, I want to get to know you better after all this, if you’ll let me anyways.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dedue Molinaro/Claude von Riegan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>15 Day Lyric Challenge 2020 [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1882966</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>40</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Petals For Armor</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hi. I'm doing another one of these. Historically I've managed to finish them, though last year I had to stop midway through and pick it up again later due to unexpected losses in my community. But I don't think I have any of those incoming this year. I'll do my best to stick to the one fic a day deadline </p><p>This fic is going to have a longer fic one day. This will be either the first or second scene of it</p><p>It's a slight AU in that I made it so Dedue was with Dimitri for two years before the battle at Grondor Field </p><p>Title from Simmer by Hayley Williams</p><p>The song lyric for today was "Wrap yourself in petals for armor" from the above mentioned song</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dimitri is dead and Dedue sits in a loaned tent from the Alliance forces on Enbarr’s doorstep the night before they’ll attack. It’s been a long three years. He’d stayed by Dimitri’s side through everything out of loyalty for the last two. He’d resigned himself to dying on the battlefield beside him before they ever even reached Enbarr. But he’s alive and Dimitri is dead and Claude absorbs those of the Kingdom forces who are willing to join them as they continued their fight.</p><p>Guilt dogs his mind. Guilt that he’s…grateful that things turned out this way. He hadn’t felt that way in the days after. He’d felt only that he wished to join Dimitri below the earth because it wasn’t right for Dimitri to be dead while he still walked through the world, but he’s beginning to wonder if perhaps that is less about loyalty and more about tying his own worth to Dimitri’s life. He’s had time to consider it. He’s had time to fight alongside others without Dimitri anywhere in sight.</p><p>His still desires Edelgard’s head the way Dimitri did, though he supposes that’s more just so he can have something to live for, if only for a little longer. After the war…he’ll figure something else out. For now, he just needs to have something to focus on to keep him going.</p><p>“Hey, can I come in?”</p><p>The front tent flap shakes as someone taps on it – Claude if he were to guess.</p><p>“Of course, my Lord,” Dedue says.</p><p>The flap opens and Claude steps inside. He’s not dressed in his usual clothing, instead dressed in a silk golden robe cinched tight around his waist. Where it parts at his chest, Dedue can see a black silk top and the robe is tight enough around his upper arms he assumes it must be sleeveless because he can’t see an outline of it. It’s not the type of loungewear he’d expect to see this deep into enemy territory, but then, he’s finding there’s a lot of things he doesn’t expect when it comes to Claude.</p><p>In his right hand, he holds a small basket and Dedue watches with a curious eye as Claude sits down beside him and pulls the small cloth covering it revealing dried blossoms of a flower he doesn’t recognize. It’s a deep and rich red with veins of yellow stretching from the middle out towards the edges of the petals.</p><p>“There’s a tradition in Almyra,” Claude says. “The night before the King rides into battle, his Queen will weave the Wyvern’s Bloom in his hair for luck and strength and wash it for him in the morning and braiding it. Other warriors do it now too, if they have a partner. But it started as something exclusively the King did.”</p><p>“I see. You would like me to do this for you?” Dedue asks. He looks Claude over and can see his hair has been washed, loose curls falling almost to his chin. It makes sense for him to take on such a duty, accustomed as he is to waiting on a noble who wished always to be on the front lines.</p><p>Claude shakes his head. “No. I would like to do it for you.”</p><p>Dedue stares, some emotion he can’t hope to define welling up in his chest and clawing its way into his throat. “You…you should not. I am a man of-“</p><p>“Duscur, and people will talk I know, and I’m a man of Almyra and people already talk about me all the time,” Claude says. “I would feel remiss to let you go into battle thinking you are alone and that there is no one still here who cares for you.”</p><p>"You do not know me,” Dedue says.</p><p>“Doesn’t mean I can’t care for you,” Claude says. “And besides, I want to get to know you better after all this, if you’ll let me anyways.”</p><p>Dedue stares down at the basket because staring at Claude feels too difficult. “It’s not right.”</p><p>"Let me do this for you. No one deserves to be alone the night before a big battle,” Claude says, voice soft, full of a gentleness Dedue can’t remember ever hearing since before the Tragedy.</p><p>“Alright.”</p><p>He turns as Claude gestures, unable to help but tense having someone at his back even if they are an ally. If he notices, Claude doesn’t say anything. Instead he pushes his fingers into Dedue’s hair and pulls the tie that keeps it neat a top his head free. His hair spills down past his jaw. It’s not very long. He’s heard in Almyra, men keep their hair longer, and there’s a question on the tip of his tongue but he bites it back, the air feeling too thick for his words.</p><p>Claude runs his fingers through his hair, shaking out any stray tangles. Then he begins to braid. He pauses every few seconds to place a flower before continuing, his motions quick but sure as he works. Despite his own short hair, he clearly has experience. This close to the top of his head, he can feel the occasional stem scratch his scalp. Claude always seems to notice, slipping his finger deep to slide against the places he’s scratched as if it will soothe the short pain. It’s a level of care that makes Dedue’s eyes burn.</p><p>“You have experience with braiding,” Dedue says. Even to his own ears, he can hear the fragility in his voice, the way it tremors. Doubtless Claude can hear it too. “I’m surprised.”</p><p>“Heh, I guess I never have had my hair that long since I’ve been in Fódlan,” Claude says. “Would you believe me if I said I used to have it down to my waist?” He yanks on Dedue’s hair, tightening the braid before tying it off and sliding his fingers into another thick segment of hair and starting again. “I got it caught in my wyvern’s saddle and fell off in front of a whole class. I cut it all off in these sloppy chunks because I didn’t know what I was doing, and my mom found me like that in her bathroom, crying my eyes out because I was so embarrassed about everything.”</p><p>“You don’t seem like the type to get embarrassed,” Dedue says.</p><p>“Yeah, I had to learn not to,” Claude says. “A half breed like me showing that kind of weakness in Almyra or Fódlan is a recipe for disaster. I never grew my hair out after that. My mom cut it to my ears so it could grow back long again, but I never let it get longer. I think I was ashamed, and I thought ‘<em>well, if no one thinks I look Almyran anyways, I might as well not even try</em>’. Stupid, I know. But hey, I was nine.”</p><p>Dedue doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything at all. It doesn’t feel awkward the way it sometimes does with others, because it doesn’t feel like Claude is expecting him to give anything he doesn’t want to. He’s just…there. He closes his eyes and lets out a breath, letting himself become absorbed in the way it feels to have another human’s fingers push through his hair and gently turn it into something beautiful.</p><p>He remembers his people having braids. Nothing as elaborate as what Claude is doing now, and they didn’t attach the same importance to length the way Claude’s people seem to, but he remembers his mother braiding his father’s hair and tucking it beneath a hat before he went to work in the fields. There’s no cultural significance that he can remember. It had always just been an expression of care.</p><p>Though he supposes, that’s what Claude is doing for him here too.</p><p>“All done.”</p><p>Claude’s voice is even softer than before and Dedue can hear a note of concern in it. He opens his mouth to talk and tastes salt on his lips. Shocked, he raises a hand to touch his wet cheeks. He hadn’t even noticed he’d begun to cry and he wracks his brain trying to think of when it could’ve been, but nothing comes to him.</p><p>“Dedue…forgive me if I’m overstepping but…who are you crying for?” Claude asks.</p><p>"Dimitri.” He says it out of habit, because everything he does has always been and always will be for Dimitri. But is that true? Did he not have a life before Dimitri? Did he not have a life before it was burnt to dust and ash and ripped from his burning fingers? The words taste like that same dust and ash. They taste like a lie.</p><p>“Okay,” Claude says. He moves away and Dedue feels the loss of his body heat like a punch to the stomach. “I hope…I hope one day you cry for yourself, too, Dedue.”</p><p>He leaves the tent and Dedue watches as his tears wash his hands clean.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>